How DSW tied up mobile engagement with choose-your-own-ending ads

Horror is how many women might react when they walk into their bedroom and find their boyfriend in bed with another woman. However, when they look down and see that the woman in question has kicked off an envy-worthy pair of stilettos, there are three possible ways to respond — and DSW Inc. ‘s latest mobile campaign let consumers take their pick. In what was internally referred to as a "mosaic" unit, the shoe retailer presented an intro video that showed the initial scene of a woman discovering infidelity at home. The call-to-action was a simple "What would you do?" that led to something akin to the choose-your-own-adventure books of the ’80s. Smartphone users could tap to look at three additional videos in which the story’s heroine either got her revenge by torching her boyfriends’ truck, went through a meltdown as she created an oil painting of the event or decided to "march on" by slipping into a great pair of heels and walked confidently away to a better life. "Our goal was customer acquisition and we weren’t able to tell our brand story with standard banner placements on mobile," Allison Holbrook, manager of digital media at DSW, told […]